I saw this charming little Irish musical-romance film today, "Once" -- a very simple movie by any measure but well done in a sort of slice-of-life crude handheld method.

I was baffled by the shooting format - while it was clearly prosumer video from the deep focus, edge artifacts, zooming at night, but the softness and noise seemed somewhere between DV and HD.

I think this may have been the first HDV feature I've seen in the theaters, which I can't say is all that technically impressive. My guess would be something like a 50i Sony Z1, I don't know. If that's what I saw, it's definitely not on the same level as an pro 2/3" HD camcorder; it's somewhere just above regular DV.

But it suited the material, which was pretty low-key and unstylized. Day scenes looked the best, more like soft 16mm.

I saw this charming little Irish musical-romance film today, "Once" -- a very simple movie by any measure but well done in a sort of slice-of-life crude handheld method.

I was baffled by the shooting format - while it was clearly prosumer video from the deep focus, edge artifacts, zooming at night, but the softness and noise seemed somewhere between DV and HD.

I think this may have been the first HDV feature I've seen in the theaters, which I can't say is all that technically impressive. My guess would be something like a 50i Sony Z1, I don't know. If that's what I saw, it's definitely not on the same level as an pro 2/3" HD camcorder; it's somewhere just above regular DV.

But it suited the material, which was pretty low-key and unstylized. Day scenes looked the best, more like soft 16mm.

I just shot a thesis film on HDV with a Redrocklens adapter and I must say I'm not at all impressed. I was consistently disappointed with how the format just falls apart with any sort of camera movement.